Inside the CK's you can still see coffee in a coffee pot, a cake and condiments, but no customers and no employees like Valerie Johnson.

Johnson said, "I got a phone call that says CK's is closed. OK, I call the other store on Park (avenue). As I am on the phone, they came in and closed that store as well and tell the girl to get out."

The CK worker said she was blindsided Sunday.

Johnson said, "I don't know what to think. We have bills. We need to pay our bills. Now what are we going to do? They just didn't care."

A Memphis realtor familiar with the CK's business deal, who didn't want his name mentioned, said the restaurants are owned by Randy Gross and Jerry Vela.

They had recently been featured in several recent publications about their big renovation plans for the restaurants, but apparently money problems forced them to close ten CK's in Memphis, along with one in Bartlett and one in Jackson, Tennessee.

Samuel Martin is a customer, "Really the service was bad. When you don't give good service, you are going to have to close."

Still, employees used to serving up a hot cup of coffee and steak and eggs say this is hard for them to handle.

Johnson said, "I'm feeling mad as Hell."

Two CK's locations not owned by Gross and Vela remain open in the Memphis area.

They are the restaurant on Poplar and Evergreen in Midtown, and the one near the airport on East Shelby Drive near Millbranch.